idle to expect that a periodical paper, however unpolitical, would go into any quarters but those of the Reformers, when published in a reforming journal. My first intention was to render it a sort of withdrawing-room, or retirement from the more public part of the Examiner; but I thought it better, upon consideration, to take the opportunity of giving myself full scope, political as well as otherwise. It is a foolish reproach to men of letters, that they meddle with politics. Who is to do so if they do not? And how is a man of any warmth of sympathy (unless he is hopeless of all change) to see what is going on in the world, and be able honestly to repress his blame and his praise? The necessity becomes stronger if he has been accustomed to do so. Politics, however, will occupy but a small part of my lucubrations.*

I am a spirit, not without hands or feet; but my strength lies in my power of flight, in my Wishing-Cap. The greatest distinction (talents apart) between me and other spirits that have manifested themselves to these latter times, is not in age or bodily

Most of Leigh Hunt's literary contemporaries meddled with politics. Sir Walter Scott dabbled in them. Southey contributed political essays to the Quarterly Review, and Coleridge wrote political articles for the Morning Post and the Morning Chronicle. Wordsworth was the author of a political pamphlet on the peace of Cintra, and Moore dashed off many a witty political squib. Wilson was a rash and bitter political writer; and Hazlitt published a volume of Political Essays. Sydney Smith wrote political pamphlets, and published political articles in the newspapers. Even "the gentle Elia" wrote political squibs and epigrams for the Examiner and the New Times. Politics, to those who are desirous of becoming acquainted with anything that concerns mankind, are, as Hunt says elsewhere, "a part of humane literature; and they who can be taught to like them in common with wit and philosophy, insensibly do an infinite deal of good by mingling them with the common talk of life, and helping to render the stream of public opinion irresistible.”. ED.

appearance (for those, as I said before, are notions); but in my being a very truth-telling spirit. I tell nothing of myself or others, which is not pure matter-of-fact, or, at least, which appears to me to be such; a verity, which I would have the reader bear in mind. He will easily distinguish between the things which I talk of in a mere spirit of fancy (as the world calls it), and what I lay before them in the grosser shapes of truth.

With regard to speaking of myself and my experiences (which I shall do very freely whenever inclined), I have several reasons for it. In the first place, it is impossible for me to sustain a fictitious character, like that of Bickerstaff and others, in the great periodical works. Secondly, authors sometimes, as well as kings, "lack subjects." Thirdly, it is advisable that authors should write only upon subjects with. which they are acquainted. Fourthly, people are often much better acquainted with themselves than the old adage implies; though many, for that reason, take care never to show it. Fifthly, I am much alone, and have been in the habit of speculating upon my feelings and adventures. I believe that if the first person we meet in the street were to put down upon paper the experiences he has had in life, his school-days, journeys, &c., they would be found interesting. I have been perplexed whether to speak of myself in the singular or the plural number, whether to subject myself to the impatience of people vainer, by saying I; or to hamper my verisimilitudes and my euphonics, with saying, We were, We would, and We once.

The last reason, or apology, which I have to lay before him for talking of myself, I shall repeat in the words of a great master of human nature :

"The most sovereign remedy for self-love is to do quite contrary to what these people direct, who in forbidding others to speak of themselves, do consequently at the same time interdict thinking of themselves too. Pride dwells in the thought: the tongue can have but a very little share in it. They fancy, that to think of one's self is to be delighted with one's self; to frequent and converse with a man's self, to be over indulgent. But this excess springs only in those who only take of themselves a superficial view, and dedicate their main inspection to their affairs; that call meditation, raving and idleness, looking upon themselves as a third person only, and a stranger. No particular quality can make any man proud, that will at the same time put so many other weak and imperfect ones, as he has in him in the other scale." - Montaigne's Essays, book ii. chap. 6.

1824.

T

HERE are three things that give a pleasant

look to the most ordinary commonplaces: health, imagination, and coming from abroad. I have been flying from place to place in London for the last week, and have made my Cap as dingy as a city swallow. At one time I dipped about Covent Garden; now I was at the West End; and then again I was at St. Paul's. I turn about the streets, as if I had never seen them before. To the list of human pleasures I have to add the satisfaction which arises from traversing a dirty lane.

There is Maiden Lane here in the neighborhood. I do not care for it because the Examiner office was once there, or because the Royal Academy there held its infant sittings; much less on account of the cidercellar; but, in the first place, I have traversed it a thousand times; secondly, here are some poor book-stalls and picture-shops; and thirdly, when Voltaire lived here "at the sign of the White Peruke," I guess that he did so to be in the neighborhood of Congreve and other wits, who had their lodgings in Southampton Street and Bow Street. My head is filled with them all. I imagine the thin Frenchman picking his way towards his abode in a lank peruke. I fancy that it

was not far off that he astonished the mob, who pelted him, with haranguing them in our language, producing as lively a movement in his favor as if they were all turned into Parisians. He got on the step of a doorway, and appealed "to the nobleness of the national character," complimenting them on their institutions and love of liberty. I believe they proposed to carry him home on their shoulders.

I like everything about Covent Garden. It pleases me even that the ground belongs to the Russells, a liberal and lettered family. I like the green market in the middle, the noble portico (not to be thought less of, after visiting Italy), the Grecian-built church, the spacious streets, the narrower ones with their book-stalls, the neighborhood of the theatres. Other associations I have mentioned elsewhere.* Though I am fond of going to the play, I do not care in general for play books; but I delight to see whole shops of them here. They are in harmony with the place. It is moving and alive with the best times of English comedy, and one of the pleasantest of English Society and verse. There, at Will's Coffee-House,† used to sit Dryden in his arm-chair, encouraging a young author with a pinch out of his snuff-box. Addison is keeping it up over the way at Button's, with Steele, Garth, Congreve, and Colonel Brett (who married Savage's mother, and bought Cibber's wig). Here come, to attend a rehearsal, Mrs. Barry, who acted

*In the Pleasant Memories Connected with the Various Parts of the Metropolis, in The Indicator. Ed.

It was on the north side of Russell Street, near Bow Street. In Malone's time was numbered 23, and occupied by a perfumer.

‡ The reader will find a lively account of the purchase in the eleventh chapter of Cibber's Apology.

ED.